Blue HTC One and blue HTC One Mini pictures and hands-on

We first broke the news that HTCwould launch a blue HTC One in May. Now three months later HTC has made it official, launching not only a blue HTC One but also a blue HTC One mini ahead of IFA 2013.

The new blue version, or should that be turquoise, of the HTC One and HTC One mini is exactly the same inside, but obviously sports the new colour, and we have to say that it is one we really like.

What's interesting is that the blue HTC One takes on a slightly more masculine feel while the HTC One Mini goes for a more feminine approach.

That's because HTC has opted to accent the HTC One with black lines and the HTC One mini with a baby blue colour. It is a subtle tweak, but one that makes a big difference in our opinion. Either way we like what we see.

There's little else to say about the blue-hued version of these two handsets. The HTC One offers the same Android 4.2.2 experience (recently upgraded) along with HTC Sense 5.0, which is HTC's latest and greatest customisation of Android.

Sitting at the heart is a 1.7GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 chipset, you've got LTE packed in and 32GB of internal memory, but all the attention should go to the display.

The 4.7-inch 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution display is an absolute cracker, with enough brightness to cut through sunny days, great viewing angles and plenty of punch to colours.

The HTC One is snappy and responsive, a well-executed handset that deserves the plaudits it receives. We currently rate it as the best smartphone of 2013 and this refresh in blue certainly adds to the black, silver and red versions on offer.

Why blue? It's this season's must-have colour supposedly, but we are sure Nokia was saying the same thing about cyan two years ago.